


Damage

by Zarla



Category: Metal Gear
Genre: Bad Sex, M/M, Sexual Abuse, traumatic past
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-15
Updated: 2006-08-15
Packaged: 2017-10-06 04:29:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/49679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zarla/pseuds/Zarla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things don't go entirely as Snake planned one night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Damage

**Author's Note:**

> Deals pretty heavily with sexual abuse, so please be careful if that upsets you.  
> Set sometime after MGS2, my feeling is sometime fairly soon afterwards. Lots of unresolved issues in this one. Tried to walk the tightrope between melodrama/wangst over a past trauma and legitimate pain over a past trauma. Hope I pulled it off.

Everything was going fine. At least, that's what Snake thought.

Otacon wasn't doing anything to make him think otherwise, certainly. All of his reactions so far, like the half-coherent mumbles of his name which Snake found he enjoyed more than he thought he would, pointed to Otacon enjoying the activity a great deal.

Well, Otacon wasn't doing anything to make him think otherwise _until_ Snake made an unexpected mistake. It was a complete shock to him, especially considering that Otacon had been moaning somewhat fervently at that point and made no indication that there'd be anything wrong with whispering something in his ear.

Snake preferred not to raise his voice (perhaps from years of Codec conversation conditioning), and he had it on some authority from some of his previous sexual partners that whispering in the ear was quite hot, so he sometimes employed it during more impassioned foreplay. Snake assumed that Otacon would join those who appreciated it and, in Snake's opinion, its strong, intimate sensuality.

He'd barely whispered his real name when Otacon took a sharp breath, almost a gasp, and completely tensed beneath him. The change was so violent and sudden that Snake could feel the tension coming off him in waves, feel all of Otacon's muscles grow hard and shake beneath his hands. He heard Otacon bite something back, he wasn't sure what, and, more clearly than anything, he could see that this change in body language indicated _fear_.

Snake pulled away from him, confused and somewhat concerned. That was not the reaction he had expected, and not a reaction he'd ever gotten from someone when doing this sort of thing. Now that he had a clearer look at Otacon's face, he could see that his eyes were shut tight and he almost looked like he was in pain. Snake looked back to make sure he wasn't accidentally kneeing Otacon in the crotch or something like that, as that had happened once with a woman when he was younger and he'd never gotten the threat of doing it again out of his mind.

"Otacon, are you okay?"

Snake's voice caused Otacon to open his eyes and look up at him. He blinked for a few seconds before covering his eyes with his hands. He leaned back, his words quick and nervous.

"Dave, I-I'm sorry, it wasn't you, it wasn't anything you did. I'm okay, honest."

Snake stared at him suspiciously, and Otacon slowly moved his hands from his eyes. He made eye contact with Snake hesitantly, and his eyes kept darting off to one side or down to his bare chest.

"I didn't mean to spoil everything..." Snake hadn't heard that frightened, nervous tone since Shadow Moses. "Please...don't stop. I just got a little tense, that's all..."

Snake stared at him. He knew Otacon was lying, and he was pretty sure that Otacon knew he knew.

"What's wrong? Why'd you tense up like that? I didn't hurt you, did I?" Snake kept his voice low. Otacon obviously lying to him about how much something bothered him didn't make Snake happy, particularly since he sounded more like the Otacon he used to know, rather than the one he knew now. Something didn't feel right.

"No, no, it wasn't you." Otacon reached out a hand to feel along the carpet. Snake guessed that Otacon was searching for his glasses. "It wasn't anything you...you weren't hurting me."

"Otacon." Snake's tone caused Otacon to freeze, his hand still in the air. "What happened?"

Otacon didn't look at him, instead closing his eyes tight almost as if trying to block him out. Whatever it was that was bothering him was not something that he felt like talking about easily, and whatever it was definitely terrified him. Why would whispering in his ear frighten him so badly?

_...'cause I was no good with people. I was scared of them. I was scared of life. I thought I could never understand them 'cause they're so illogical._

"You looked like you were frightened."

Otacon let his hand fall to the carpet and took some deep breaths. When he opened his eyes again, he still couldn't look at Snake.

"It's not you..." Otacon said softly. "It's not your fault...it's mine."

Snake stared at Otacon, frowning, as he sorted through all the things that Otacon had told him, anything that would explain something like this. Whispering during foreplay... What kind of sexual encounters could Otacon have had to inspire such an intense negative reaction? Snake had difficulty believing that Otacon's feelings for Wolf were reciprocated in such a way, and Otacon had never really mentioned any other romantic experiences in his life...

Except...

Snake's eyes widened and he immediately got off of him. Otacon sat up to try and stop him, his hands sliding across Snake's skin without hold. Snake could see fear in Otacon's eyes again, although this wasn't the same kind as before.

"No! No, don't, I'm sorry, please-"

"Otacon, why didn't you tell me?" Snake found himself growling the words, and Otacon was torn for a few seconds between reaching out to Snake or pulling his hands back. In the end, he decided to pull away and take hold of his upper arms, as if protecting himself, and look down.

Snake waited. He knew that Otacon didn't want to talk about it, but he wanted an explanation and he wanted it now. He almost...if he'd known, he never would have....Snake could feel the rush of adrenaline and the twitch of muscles and he wanted a neck in his hands that he could snap.

"I don't like talking about it." Otacon's voice held anger along with guilt. He shut his eyes tightly. "It happened a long time ago, I'm over it now."

"You're not over it, Otacon." Feel the rush and heat of someone's blood running under her skin before exerting enough pressure to break the spinal cord. "That reaction is proof enough."

"It was my fault it happened anyway!" Otacon's voice rose for a few seconds, then quieted as if he realized what he was doing. "If I hadn't given in to her, then..."

"Don't blame yourself," Snake snapped. Otacon shuddered, but didn't open his eyes. "It wasn't your idea. She was the one who-"

"I shouldn't have given in to it!" Otacon's anger matched his own, and this Snake knew was self-directed. Otacon pressed his hands to his head, winding his fingers into his hair tightly. "I shouldn't have let her...if I hadn't, none of it would have happened. I was weak, Dave! That's why my father died, that's why E. E.-"

"Stop it!" Snake leaned forward and put his hands on Otacon's shoulders, and Otacon made a short, surprised sound. Snake's grip and voice were tight with frustration. "Stop it, Otacon! You know that's not true."

Otacon was silent for a few moments, his breathing fluttery and quick. Snake could see Otacon's hands shaking and his knuckles turning white, tremors moving all the way down his arms.

"It doesn't matter how many times I say it, how many times I tell myself that..." Otacon's voice broke in several places. "It still feels true. No matter what I do, it always feels like...it was my fault..."

Snake watched him for a few more seconds, then let his voice soften a little. "Otacon, that woman used you. She abused her power and her position for personal gain. You shouldn't let her actions become your burden."

"That's not just it, Dave." Otacon's entire body was shaking now, and his voice was weak. "I said _yes_, I agreed to it. I agreed to it, that's why...that's why it's my fault, too." Otacon looked up at him, his eyes slightly watery. "If I stopped her, if I'd been strong enough to resist, if I just-...then I wouldn't feel this bad, but...I didn't." Otacon let his eyes fall. "I didn't, and I can't forget..."

Snake wanted to just shake Otacon until he realized that it wasn't his fault, that he shouldn't blame himself for being abused, just shake the guilt right out of him, but he knew it wouldn't work. If the answer to his guilt was something so simple then he wouldn't have been carrying it for so long.

Frustrated at his inability to solve the problem, and at the specter of _never_ being able to solve the problem, Snake loosened his grip and leaned back a little. Otacon was still shaking fitfully in front of him.

"So..." Snake wished he had a cigarette right now. "She whispered to you..."

Otacon blinked at him in surprise for a few seconds, as if shocked that Snake would have deduced that on his own. Then Otacon looked down again, still shaking and he let go of his hair. His hands trembled as he again gripped his upper arms. He eventually nodded, his voice still fairly weak.

"Yeah."

Snake wasn't sure what to do at this point. He'd pinpointed the problem and the behavior he'd have to avoid if this would ever happen again in the future, but he had yet to find a solution. Otacon sustained this damage a long time ago and never had a chance to heal correctly. Snake knew the permanent scars that could leave on a person, as he had quite a few such scars himself. Some damage went too deep to heal completely, even with all the medical attention in the world.

There may have been a way to help with that kind of wound but Snake didn't know what it was. He still felt somewhat ignorant on the delicacies of how other people worked, apart from physical knowledge. Social interaction had never been very important to him, particularly with people who weren't soldiers. It was unique that Otacon had ever gotten this close to him in the first place. Maybe that was because Otacon simply hadn't left over time and Snake had gotten used to him being there, grown to accept the new, steady presence in his life. He wasn't sure.

Relationships were not his forte.

Snake wanted to do something, he wanted to fix it, but he had no idea of where to start. If Otacon's stepmother were here...although, he reminded himself, it wasn't her that was the problem. It was her ghost. The aftereffects of what she'd done that still lingered over all these years.

Although he'd read about people still harboring guilt over abuse in their past, he couldn't understand why Otacon couldn't see that it wasn't his fault. He was used, the position of power his stepmother had had been abused and there was no reason for Otacon to blame himself. The fact that he _did_, despite all logic, made Snake feel angry and frustrated. Mostly at Otacon's stepmother and to some small degree at Otacon himself, and again he wished he could just kill whatever it was inside a person that caused that self-hatred.

It was never that easy.

This was why he avoided relationships in the first place.

Snake stood. Otacon watched him with wide, frightened eyes.

"You're not leaving, are you?" It was an honest, earnest question and the words came from him too easily. It made Snake feel uneasy. "I've...well, I've been working on...getting over that, but it's been hard...especially with what happened to E.E...."

Emma. The whole mess had probably reopened a lot of old wounds, and Snake was surprised that he hadn't noticed before now. Then again, maybe he hadn't really been looking...and it wasn't something he expected to show up when the two of them were about to have hot, mindless sex right on the floor, although now that he thought about it, that's precisely when he _should_ have expected it.

He'd heard Otacon admit it himself to his sister's dead body, and still, perhaps some part of him didn't want to believe it to be true. Some part of him didn't want to think of his friend's past being so...painful. Otacon seemed so confident and assertive after Shadow Moses and his life had gained that elusive purpose that people spent years searching for, and it would have been nice to have someone in his life who was comparatively normal, all things considered. Otacon was a nerd, he had that awkward lack of social grace and occasional arrogance that came with being a nerd, and that was all Snake ever expected to deal with and he'd dealt with it very well, right up to when Otacon had abruptly and without warning revealed that there was a great deal beneath the surface that he'd never been aware of.

He'd had enough of having to reevaluate the important relationships in his life after sudden bombshells like that, and he didn't want to have to do the same with Otacon. Otacon seemed to feel similarly, as after they had escaped Big Shell he didn't mention what happened or his past, acting as confident and optimistic as he had before the mission began.

Like nothing happened.

Maybe Otacon didn't want to remember it happening either.

Perhaps that emotion during their early fumbling with each other's clothes hadn't been the sexual desire that Snake had assumed, but hope that this would prove that the whole thing didn't happen, the whole thing never happened, it was dead and buried and they could move on.

_I'm through regretting the past..._

God, they had devoted their lives to moving on and leaving their pasts behind, to live for their own future. To the idea that it was possible, and...

That train of thought led down a dark path. He couldn't allow himself to be discouraged so easily...after all, his scars had never faded, but they didn't hold him back. A reminder of the past wasn't the same as living in it, as being trapped by it...

Snake needed a cigarette right now. It was the future that counted, he had to keep that in mind. Make your own future. Define your own path, and Otacon had been with him on that path for too long for something like this to destroy it.

"After everything..." Otacon mumbled to himself, as if testing the silence that had grown between them.

Snake smirked. "After everything that's happened, I'm surprised you can smile at all."

Otacon let out a very soft, awkward laugh in response.

"I told you before...I want to live. It's no good being swallowed up by regret..." Their thoughts ran parallel at the strangest times. Otacon's voice softened. "We've got to live for the future. That's what I think..."

A healthy outlook, but his reaction to Snake's whisper proved that it would take more than an outlook to undo the damage done, if it could be undone at all. When it came down to it, how much of the past could be erased or forgotten, idealistic view or no...it was a question he wanted to ignore and invalidate but it kept nagging at him, and he couldn't afford to lose his focus again, this was the only thing that truly gave his life any greater meaning now and he just couldn't...

"I need a smoke." Snake took a few steps towards where he'd last left his pack.

"Wait!"

Snake turned to look at Otacon, who was still holding onto his arms, protecting himself from that unseen foe.

"Yeah?"

"You're not...mad at me, are you?" Again, the question was honest and without any self-pity. Like being mad would simply be the logical reaction Snake would have, and Otacon wanted to confirm it as so. "I'd understand why you would be..." Again Otacon's eyes shifted to one side and Snake noticed the faint tinge of red to his cheeks. Not that big of a surprise, considering. Otacon got flustered and red when he saw girly pictures, as Snake had found out. It wasn't hard to coax a blush out of him. "You were really getting going..."

Snake waited for a few seconds and tried to keep his voice light. "I can wait."

He was about to turn back to his cigarettes when Otacon shifted again, pulling his knees up and leaning forward on them. He kept his eyes to the carpet.

He spoke quietly, with a kind of quiet acceptance in his words. "I don't know...if I'll stop doing...that. If I can stop doing that. I'm really trying and I...I really want to but...I don't know if I can..."

And unspoken beneath his words, again the same sentiment in the same honest, detached way, _and if that's too much for you, you can leave. I understand._

Snake, at least, had an idea of how to respond to that.

"It's okay, Otacon. I'm not going anywhere."

Otacon looked at him, blinking a few times like Snake was an unexpected error in a set of calculations. There was no hurt or fear behind his eyes, merely confusion and mild surprise. It seemed like Otacon had prepared himself for both possibilities, Snake leaving and Snake staying, and simply hadn't expected the one that came to pass.

Figures, sometimes the guy was just like a computer in how he thought through things. Probably came with the territory. Made things easier to handle...

Snake smirked again. "I just won't do that anymore."

Otacon blinked some more, his mouth slightly open, then he nodded and smiled. That was encouraging. Maybe Snake could get the hang of this after all.

"Okay, Dave."

They stared at each other for a few more minutes, then Snake left to have his smoke. He watched the cars on the road go by while he breathed out clouds of white into the night air. After a while, Otacon joined him, wearing one of his unbuttoned shirts and not saying a word. The two of them watched other people go by in silence for a while, and when Snake snuck a look at him, he saw that Otacon didn't look troubled. He wasn't smiling, but he didn't look troubled.

That was something at least.

He flicked the cigarette out the window.

_Here's to damage, permanent and otherwise._


End file.
